I come to you today to share my recent findings and give you an update on the progress of the new government and how this relates towards the international rollout of the IQD for Iraq.

Today's news letter, as in all my news letters, is a continuation of the ongoing saga of the IQD RV process. Please refer back to my last news letter of 10/19 (LINK) as this news letter is a continuation of this news.

Today’s News

Today is Monday 10/20 and Iraqi progress is moving forward very rapidly now.

The news is just amazing and this could turn out to be a very interesting week…hint…hint..

So I just had to send out a quick news letter to let everyone know the news.

In case you missed it, Abadi’s cabinet is now fully seated as of last Saturday.

The coalition against terrorism, lead by the USA, has been granted full permission to send in troops (boots on the ground) to assist in the crisis against DAASH and ISIS. They have a strategy in place. It is to be implemented soon.

Update on the Oil and Gas Law (HCL)

Anyone saying that the HCL law is done, done done is nuts, nuts nuts! I mean nutso and should go back to the first grade when it comes to gathering information about what is happening in Iraq. Obviously they have not been tracking the news on this topic and have no business speaking for Iraq on it.

How could they possible say it is done? It is because they are simply repeating what they have been told to say and tell you without any real analysis done by themselves. Are they just lazy or simply irresponsible? They must like being in the spot light and taking all the bows but do they really deserve it? This to me is irresponsible. Anyhow, so let us now look at just where HCL is. I, as many do, believe this too is a key to getting the RV done. It also must be concluded to pass the budget. Gee …could this also be something holding up the budget?…see how its all interconnected like a Spider’s web.

Would they not have to know how much money to allocate the provinces according to the funds allocated to them according to the new law? The new law uses the latest census taken. There is also a matter of a new census taken a couple years ago that must now be incorporated into the law. Other provinces take all citizens into account including elderly, men, women and children. For some reason the original HCL law did not include the children of the Kurdistan region since their census (the basis for payment) excluded children. This is being remedied. This is the hold up with HCL.

In order to know where the HCL law is exactly at this point in time let us first take a step back in time. Lets go back a few years ago. Do you remember all the inter fighting between parliament (Maliki goons) and the Kurds over this law? You now know the basis for the differences. Is this new government now going to address these differences and get this law enacted? I think so and I will try to explain.

1) On 07/02/11 - the office of Deputy Prime Minister for Energy Affairs, Hussein al-Shahristani announced the government introduced " Some amendments "to the draft oil law, which is long overdue and reviewed by the Energy Commission of the Cabinet. So just what were these amendments? They dealt with the % allocated to the provinces based on the population.

2) On 8/28/11 - the GOI announces the submittal of the draft oil and gas law to parliament for ratification and approval.

3) On 09/06/11 - the parliamentary commission on oil and energy announced that that the draft oil and gas law submitted by the government to the House of Representatives on 8/28/11, involves a "constitutional violation" to confiscate the right of the provinces and territories, indicating that it is possible to modify the bill and enriching to find a suitable formula to be agreed upon between the political blocs.

4) 10/20/14 – So today in Monday and this version of the HCL law from 8/28 has been the source of contention every since and the law simply has sat waiting for the new government to be elected so they could take another look at it and make any needed changes before re-submitting it to parliament again. It was just a matter of time when they would around to doing it. Part of the 27 reforms (used as the basis to form the new government) says this issue must be addressed within 30 days of the forming of the new government. The clock started ticking last Saturday 10/18.

5) Going Forward this week– The law submitted from 08/28/11 (Maliki’s GOI) was once again reviewed by the House of Representatives Energy Affairs Ali Fayad, today (Monday), “that the amendment of the law of oil and gas from 07/02/11 has become inevitable due to the expansion of the size differences”. So at least now they re-open the case and recognize the issues of contention once again (like shaking the dust of the law….lol…)

Said Fayad for "Ply News", that "the oil and gas law, which was launched during the past parliamentary sessions has not been settled and is still under discussion and criticism by some of the blocks, which sees a lot of problems and injustice right, particularly to the Kurdistan Alliance. Note that "the pursuit of some of the blocks to the need to amend this law put forward strongly the amendments of 07/02/11, but was never taken very seriously at the time due to the amount of contentions.

Added Fayad said that "after the expansion of the differences between the blocs about the law as well as the new consensus that formed the basis of which the government is amending the law of oil and gas inevitable," adding that "it is expected to play for the oil and gas committee to study the proposals made by some of the blocks in order to modify and put to the vote."

Hurry! I could hardly believe I was hearing news. This is all super good for us. This is why I need all of you to really understand the hold up. This law is not resolved until parliament votes and passes it. Once in the gazette we are home free.

Update on the Currency Reform Project

In my last news letter I talked about members of the parliamentary Economic and Finance Committees, making requests for implementation of the “project to delete the zeros” from the currency. Pointing to the existence of some of the obstacles that have prevented its implementation.

This Committee will host the CBI governor to learn practical steps for the implementation of the project to delete the zeros from the currency and in coordination with the Central Bank to determine the most prominent problems that hindered the implementation of the project. I have learned that this meeting would take place sometime this week.

The parliamentary Economic Committee revealed she hosted, on Monday (today), the central bank governor on the Keywords and looked him anti-money laundering crimes and develop the work of private banks.

The committee member said Jawad al-Bolani told a news conference with a number of members of the Economic Commission said that "we discussed the assets traded for the mass of cash, charge by the central bank, as well as laws that help the development of his work, which will be legislation and include the Central Bank Law, banks, law of money laundering."

I did not hear of any announcement from this meeting of going ahead to start up once again the project to delete the zeroes or the currency reform. However I totally expect that this news will come to us sometime this week. Something for us to watch for.

Update on the 2014 Budget

First let me say the 2014 budget is not, I repeat not passed into law. In fact it is not yet even completed. They have not even submitted it to parliament as of today, sofar. Today is not over but I expect to see other laws passed first.

Just keep remembering the Spider’s web analog I gave you many news letters ago.

Some of these laws you will need the budget to be opened to implement them. You will need the revalued currency to spend it. It’s all interconnected and we should see a flurry of activity all at once when these laws (as in the 27 reforms) are passed. Dr. Allawi told us this in 2010. He said (I do not quote) - when the times comes we will see a package of laws implemented all at once.

I sent you the list of the Erbil law in a past news letter. I hope you kept this list and maybe printed it. I send this list to you so you can follow it. Once all these laws are addressed and you see them passed then we will be in a very good window to see the RV happen. I totally believe this to be true. This is the plan I keep speaking of.

So on Saturday, Finance Minister Hoshyar Zebari said he would work to expedite the completion of the budget of 2014 and sent to the Cabinet for approval, pointing out that the time has come to start work after the completion of the government of Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi.

If this is true then we should see a flurry of activity on these other laws that need to be addressed….and we are now beginning to see the activity beginning with the HCL law. More to come…

Summary

So today I send you a brief update. It is all amazing news and very good news. We are many steps closer to an RV and we can almost see that the weeks (not months) ahead of us could bring us the progress we need to see.

Why

The USA led coalition has received approval to send in more troops as “boots on the ground” to fight ISIS. It is my understanding of the situation that the new strategy will kick into high gear sometime within the next 10 days.

As far as the budget passing. I believe it has to occur very soon to fund the war effort. There are also other laws too interconnected with the budget law since they are funded by it and the numbers have to be approved first by the laws then placed in the updated budget. It is hard to separate them.

This week I totally expect to hear some news that the currency reform project will be restarted and a tentative implementation completion date given to us. In fact I will go out on a limb and tell you it will happen. Just remember to look for it.

Then when can we expect the RV?

I want to emphasize once again this final announcement of the IQD going international will not happen until the USA feels the country of Iraq and its government is stable, secure, non-sectarian and is a functional government. This is has been the plan all along. They may have wavered a bit on how the plan was implemented but the overall plan guidelines have not changed. This I know now as fact not rumor.

Note: I am no longer saying fully formed government as criteria since I believe this requirement has now been completed. It is the very first “fully” seated government for Iraq since the invasion of 2003. Congratulations to the Abadi government !